A Few Words With: Vitor Meira

Vitor Meira is back at Kansas Speedway this weekend, this time driving for the legendary A.J. Foyt. Meira has been involved in several memorable finishes at Kansas but has yet to get his first win. He shared a few words about Kansas this week:

Question: What is the track at Kansas like?

Meira: It’s really a normal one and a half mile oval, very standard except for the seams, the seams [in the asphalt] are very severe. You can run over them [across them] but you can’t run on them. If you put a tire on the seam, it really moves the car—it loses a lot of grip. If you start turning in [to the corner] on the seam, you’re eventually going to wash up. The seam doesn’t have any grip. That’s the only trick: to have a good line, you have to always be aware of the seams.”

Question: What is traffic like at Kansas?

Meira: “Nowadays in the IRL, everything is so close that even if you are by yourself and you are trying to overtake a slower car by moving up to the second lane, it becomes difficult. You’re going to have to run a longer line and the guy running the shorter line has the advantage. Since everything is really close, it becomes really difficult, but if there is a place where traffic is a little bit easier to deal with, that would be Kansas Speedway.”

Question: How do you feel about your success at Kansas?

Meira: “For me there was a time there [2004-2006] when I finished in the top three for three races in a row. It’s one of those tracks where I know what to do and what to ask from the car…I really like the track and maybe it fits what I like from the car. It’s a track that changes a lot during the race and I was able to predict what the track and how the car was going to be by the end of the race so we could prepare for that. You have to prepare your car for the last ten laps of the race, not really the first ten.”